Posted
by
timothy
on Wednesday December 17, 2008 @06:26PM
from the probably-nothing-more-than-an-electrical-meter dept.

coondoggie writes "A
new working model of the mysterious 2,100-year-old astronomical calculator, dubbed the Antikythera Device, has been unveiled, incorporating the most recent discoveries announced two years ago by an international team of researchers. The new model was demonstrated by its creator, former museum curator Michael Wright, who had created an earlier model based on decades of study."

Surprised with all the negativity. Studying cryptic machines that change the way we view technology's historical progression and after years of work crafting a working replica hardly seems worthy of scorn.

Plus people like to take pride that we are much more advanced then we were 2000 years ago.However after the burning of the Library of Alexandra it sent man kind 1000 years back in progress. The thousands of years after have been in general very tough for human survival only for the past 500 years or so have we caught up, but before that the concept of playing with gears and realizing that if you have a small one and a large one they move at different speeds was to academic and in general worthless as it didn't put food on the table.

You mean tough for human survival in Europe, Africa and the middle east. The Library's loss certainly didn't affect the civilizations of the Indian subcontinent and the Americas. Like the Nobel prize-winning economist Amartya Sen says, the philosophers of south-east Asia were asking questions the western world has only recently begun to ask itself while Europe was still in the dark ages.

I think it is an issue that civilizations with the library of Alexandra was actually that much more advance then most of the other cultures of the world.

The expansion of science in historical view really boomed lately. The Library of Alexandra was in essence a place you can go to find all the knowledge of the known world, allowing a place to go to seek knowledge in an environment that will let you do so.

The Library of Alexandra was in essence a place you can go to find all the knowledge of the known world, allowing a place to go to seek knowledge in an environment that will let you do so.

All true, and they also followed a somewhat "information wants to be free" philosophy. The Library of Alexandria reportedly had a policy that any ship that entered it's harbor was to surrender any texts or writings they had on board to the library for them to be copied by the scribes and added to the library before being returned to the ship of origin.

Plus people like to take pride that we are much more advanced then we were 2000 years ago.

Or rather, they get defensive, worrying that we AREN'T more advanced than we were 2,000 years ago. We're definitely more advanced if we get to pick the definition of "advanced", but that's not saying much. My definition of "advanced" would rest more on public morality and virtue than on technology; as would, incidentally, all the Greek philosophers' from Pythagoras to Aristotle. I see the era of this device, around 500 BC -- an era that included not only Plato and Socrates and their followers in the West, but Confucius and Lao-Tzu and their followers in the East -- a pinnacle of civilization that we have yet to again match.

Not only slavery, but capital punishment for most crimes. The trouble people have is that we really only have the notes made by the visionaries of that time, and they're trying to compare that to the teeming masses of Oprah viewers now. They had their teeming masses of slackjaws then too, they just didn't bother to write down what they said.

Actually, slavery already stopped long before 500BC in China. At that time, China has already gone through a few hundred years of war. The need of talents in all these countries and the fight between royal families and nobilities brought warriors/heros, philosophers, strategists, and scholars etc. into highest positions of governments, which will very soon end the era of feudalism in the "country", which later form a periodic country wide examination to select all levels of government officers.

Surprised with all the negativity. Studying cryptic machines that change the way we view technology's historical progression and after years of work crafting a working replica hardly seems worthy of scorn.

Some of us graduated with Computer Science degrees and all we studied were cryptic machines, trying desperately to craft working replicas. Does that explain it?

It looks like Digg has invaded slashdot.
Anyways,
The fact that 2 millennia ago some were able to make a calculator to predict eclipses is astounding, taking into consideration the religious beliefs and the gullibility of the masses on those times.

All in all, we're not. There are still a few problems. (Obviously!) However, the climate in Ancient Greece, Arabia, hell, even apparently Ancient Egypt wasn't so ridiculous as during the European Dark Ages, which is what I think you are generally referring to. This is probably the best time for Science in the history of Humanity. (IANA Historian.)

I say these days sometimes science is just as much religion and scientists are it's priests. Scientists and doctors of all types are the untouchables of this time, having the enlightened form of thinking and being that much closer to the explanation of everything than everybody else. Sometimes, they even feel like that and think they're infallible in their thinking.

Yes, especially as it was those religious beliefs that allowed this device to be created in the first place, or did you miss the part about the Babylonian priests? Good God, can't you people get off your Anti-Religion Flaming Horse for one thread a day?

Yes, especially as it was those religious beliefs that allowed this device to be created in the first place, or did you miss the part about the Babylonian priests? Good God, can't you people get off your Anti-Religion Flaming Horse for one thread a day?

*Flaming High Horse*...Preview is your friend. And to answer Dill and Dun - Oddly enough in my D&D campaign you can get a horse that flames (in battle +1d4 to who ever you are fighting (save vs dex for half)). Mostly they are owned by the CN Priests of a Fire (an elf slaying) god of my Campaign.

People seem to forget a lot that a lot of the most brilliant science developments for a long time was due mainly to religion. Go no far than all that astronomy, mathematics, physiology, trigonometry have to thanks the Arab Sufis and scientists of old. And all their motivation were base on spreading and understanding Islam.

If you go further back you see for example the Maya Calendar, was that an Atheistic scientist who devised and created? No, it was probably a bunch of priest working with the paradigms of t

People seem to forget a lot that a lot of the most brilliant science developments for a long time was due mainly to religion.

That's arguing that the bathwater is OK because there's a baby in it. The fact that many scientific discoveries happened in a religious context is no more relevant than the moon landings happening in a NASA context. There'd have been science without religion just as there would be moon landings without Cape Canaveral.

There'd have been science without religion just as there would be moon landings without Cape Canaveral.

To me that is like advocating Parthenogenesis. The scientific method would have arisen by itself without intervention. Only because in many many cultures across the planet that had the chance - it *never* did, ever. Religion gave context and organization. Ogg may have made stone tools but something else made him human.

Directly and indirectly, religon has been responsible for more people dying than any other cause EVER.

I see this often, but it's just plain wrong.

Secular leaders ushering in various forms of extreme socialism managed to surpass it in a single century, and general nationalism was far ahead of it anyway.

Actually, if you examine the top "secular" deathmongering followings, you find that their "non-religious" states actually implemented the same exact sort of faith-based unswerving belief in fact-defying mythology you find in religion. National Socialism was based on "uncritical loyalty" to the Fuhrer, and embraced such outlandish beliefs as that the Aryans were not descended from apes, but were aliens from outer space sent to rule the Earth; the Marxist/Communist regimes (while paying lip service to rationa

Face it, the only thing that can motivate people to mass-murder is an irrational, unjustified belief in some sort of bullshit worldview.... The most monstrous crimes against humanity have invariably been inspired by unjustified belief. It is the propensity for people to ignorantly believe in religious or religion-analogous movements that is the problem

And the only thing that can motivate them to stark rationalism is? I dont see where Atheism is the answer. If I read you right it is Faith itself and not r

And the only thing that can motivate them to stark rationalism is? I dont see where Atheism is the answer. If I read you right it is Faith itself and not religion that is the problem. So why not hate every faith based thing? Why chose religion for your ire?

Most people that consider themselves atheist ARE against all "faith based things" - it's just that religion is the most pervasive and damaging one in our society at present, and so is an important target. If religion were stamped out tomorrow, we would probably then be complaining primarily about horoscopes in the newspaper (they cause people to act irrationally and often to the detriment of the society around them, so while it's nowhere near as bad as religion, that would be next on my personal hit-list).

Imagine if they and Bohrs had been right though. Planets and moons in perfect circles, atoms and electrons in perfect orbits. I am no ID person, and though a Christian I will swear on a Bible that I have evolved germs many times and in many ways. But funny to think about 'The Blind Watchmaker' if the universe ran like a clock! An interesting thought experiment nothing more.

Europe in general was in a period of declining agricultural output, and not surprisingly, was concerned primarily with feeding themselves first.

A natural consequence of declining technology

It withstood repeated invasions by Muslim conquerors on two fronts

Nature abhors a vacuum. If you are seen as ignorant savages, other people will try to invade.

Not to mention a few bouts with the Plague which killed about 1/3 of Europe

A disease carried by fleas, a consequence of the abolition of the Roman habit of bathing. To take a bath one needs to undress, nakedness might lead to sex, and virginity equals holiness [wikipedia.org] according to the Roman Catholic church.

And in spite of the above, the Catholic Church started the University system

Ah yes - like believing in a god who polymorph at will into multiple animal forms (Zeus) didn't require gullibility? Not to mention the things gods of other contemporary religions got up. Despite what your nakedly displayed bias and ignorance would have you believe, all religions require gullibility.

I'd love to get one of these for my shelf or desk somewhere. I wonder if someone would make these and sell them on ThinkGeek.com? Another good question might be whether or not someone has modelled the device in OpenGL? It would make a really cool screensaver!

No, but it reminds me of the lockward screensaver in gnome/ubuntu. Its been my screensaver for years, and although its technically more greycode emulating than this, it looks like the back of the device in the demonstration video, and usually memorizes anyone who happens to see it.

There was an article a few months ago about this that stated [cnet.com] that the mechanism was used to calculate Olympiads.That was the first interpretation of the mechanism. Now the model shows that it was much more than that as it can predict eclipses and planetary positions.

As for it not being a 'computer' I disagree. There are two forms of computers, analog and digital. An analog computer is basically a measuring device like a ruler or slide rule, thermometer and so on.The mechanism is definitely an analog computer.The Greeks were very good at building gadgets and even extremely large hydro-mechanical machines. Most of these constructions were used in temples to simulate thunder, automatic opening and closing doors, automated movement of objects (think Temple of Doom).Their skill was renown in the ancient world and the mechanism is a tribute to their ingenuity.

Computers are programmable, this only solves the problems it was designed to solve.

Did it? Bloody hell! Perhaps, one day, the modern computing industry will catch up with ancient Greece. So much has been lost...:-)

PS: It sure ain't Turing complete but neither is any other analogue computer. Not sure about the people who did calculations for a living and used to be called "computers": people can be pretty hard to reprogram (especially without making a mess).

Some (admittedly vague) requirements for something to be a computer are allowing variable inputs that produce variable outputs based on a programmable function. If there were only one function it would be a (primitive) calculator. This is not even a calculator. It's a clock. As one would expect there is natural evolution here from less complex to more complex.

As an aside I'm not sure why everyone wants to find examples of our ancestors having super advanced technology that was lost in the mists of time.

It's not that the mechanism is amazing by modern standards that is interesting. It's not not even that the mechanism must have been amazing by the standards of the time when it was manufatured. It's that the mechanism is amazing by the standards of at least 1000 years after it was apparently manufactured. Historians find stuff like that interesting; sorry you're not impressed.

It's that the mechanism is amazing by the standards of at least 1000 years after it was apparently manufactured

The Greeks and Romans had some clever inventions [wikipedia.org]. The sad part is that all the efforts they did at math and engineering came to a stop, and most of it got lost during the Middle Ages. If you travel through southern Europe, you'll see several engineering works, like the Pont du Gard, Coliseum, Arles amphitheatre, etc, which had no equal a thousand years after they were built.

It's a bit frightening that any intellectual progress was stopped for a thousand years, and I wonder could it happen again?

In 2000 years, our space faring decedents may say the same thing about space travel. "They put this space capsule on the moon and these robots on mars, it's too bad that all that intellectual progress was reversed in the 1000 years to follow".

But the technology we have today isn't really capable of space travel (look how expensive and impractical it is). These Greek and Roman inventions are the same. You can't really use that steam engine to do any work, and it is impractical to build those kind of structures with your hands or with animal power.

Today's steam engines, and internal combustion engines, on the other hand, can really make building those kind of structures possible on a large scale.

These Greek and Roman inventions are the same. You can't really use that steam engine to do any work, and it is impractical to build those kind of structures with your hands or with animal power.

That's true with respect to some of the more abstract tricks they discovered and couldn't find a use for -- the steam engine, as you mentioned, or parabolic mirrors -- but there are an awful lot of areas where the ancient Greeks and Romans did indeed make full practical use of technologies that were lost for more than a millennium afterwards. The GPP mentioned architecture and building technology, which is a biggie. There's also road layout, sewerage, military tactics, field medicine, firefighting technology, and a whole lot more. So it is reasonable to regard the Middle Ages as a reversal in many ways.

However, the rot set in earlier than most people think. A lot of it gets blamed on the rise of religious sects and the destruction of the library at Alexandria, but I see those as symptoms more than causes. A few centuries earlier there were lots of important libraries. If that had still been the case when the Alexandrian library was finally destroyed -- whenever that was -- its destruction wouldn't have mattered nearly as much.

However, the rot set in earlier than most people think. A lot of it gets blamed on the rise of religious sects and the destruction of the library at Alexandria, but I see those as symptoms more than causes. A few centuries earlier there were lots of important libraries. If that had still been the case when the Alexandrian library was finally destroyed -- whenever that was -- its destruction wouldn't have mattered nearly as much.

I think that's very true, but the end cause of all that intellectual degradation

You could also credit Christianity with the paving the way for science with the idea of a lawful universe - particularly given the number of devout Christians who contributed to science: Mendel, Newton, etc.

Also Christianity does not teach that the material world does not matter. The afterlife is what matters, but what happens in this world determines what happens in the after life.

Do you not think that the collapse of the Roman Empire and barbarian invasions might just have had something to do with the loss of knowledge?

Who in Europe continued maintainning libraries and preserving knowledge through this period? The church, and monasteries in particular.

The death of the roman empire was certain before it was born. The whole empire survived on the labor of others. But by looting those other people, they were slowly destroying the source of their livelihood. They starved people to build the colosseum and their aquanauts and to supply their grand army. It was continued growth that sustained them, but once they had expanded as far as they could, the rot set in. It was only a matter of time before the barbarian hordes invaded, but Rome was long gone by that time.

This is not unlike our financial market which is basically a ponzi scheme dependent on continued growth to guarantee returns and sustain many people's needlessly lavish lifestyles. Of course it will come crashing down! Do you really think it can grow forever? There are only so many people and so many resources on the earth, and we have nowhere else to go.

But apart from the steam engine, parabolic mirrors, architecture and building technology, road layout, sewerage, military tactics, field medicine and firefighting technology what have the Romans and Greeks ever done for us?

Whoa, whoa, 16th century? Are you joking? First of all, they were already in decline by then. Second, isn't that a ridiculously long period of time for a *golden* age? I mean typically that phrase is reserved for a fairly short period of time where these is an extreme and unusual level of achievement, like the best part of a great ruler's reign. If it lasts for 800 years then it's not extreme OR unusual. I mean that's like almost 60% of their entire history... how can so much of it be considered golden? Isn

Note that some of ancient Greek technology has still not been equaled by all our industrial and scientific progress -- for example their bronzework. There is no machine and no person on the planet who could reproduce a Greek bronze helmet. We have no idea how they could have done it. Similarly, it is only in the last 100 years that our understanding of metallurgy has increased to the point where we can understand what's going on in the traditional process of Samurai sword making. But if that tradition h

They were first called so in no derogative sense, "middle" here means between antiquity and the newest ages. The term "Middle Ages" got such a negative connotation exactly because of that extreme lack of progress that only an Anonymous Coward could possibly deny.

Europe went into the dark ages barely able to smelt iron, and come out of it as a world beating civilisation[SIC] able to project its power across the globe

It's not that the mechanism is amazing by modern standards that is interesting.

I think it's pretty amazing by modern standards. If you watch the video, there's a "clock hand" for every visible planet. That wouldn't be so impressive if it were heleocentric... just a bunch of simple gears. But it's geocentric, which means that depending on the relative position to the earth, sometimes they're going forward and sometimes backwards, and sometimes standing still. And the position of the moon is not based on

NetworkWorld's sock puppets are working overtime for Christmas. This is at least the 3rd story in 24 hours or so to make slashdot. Sad, desperate, or what? Mind you, if you've read any of their site you'll understand why they need to spam to get readers.